Alere Menya Styorneu Stodunim
Alere Menya Styorneu Stodunim, or AMSS for short, is the agency responsible for humanity's presence in the Cordens system, handling all interstellar travel from Mitstot. Based on the frigid planet of Heimvegi, AMSS actively recruits from all human planets. History Originally founded under the name Muvinnslu Styornar, or "Mining the Stars" as an exploratory body to find resources on the moons of Heimvegi, AMSS' technological breakthroughs in the process of exploring the nearer reaches of the system paved the way for human colonization of other planets within Mitstot. As the goals of the company expanded, the name changed, eventually settling into the name almost all of humanity knows it as now. AMSS maintained its path of simple colonization of Mitstot until roughly 858 E4, when Fajar Darinn took up the role of Director and shifted the agency's gaze to the stars they had once been named for. Though the new experimental interstellar spacecraft were completed as early as 874 E4, test flights didn't begin for another decade as launch facilities continually failed safety inspections. Eventually, AMSS moved to shuttling test pilots into Low Heimvegi Orbit, and assembling launch platforms between the planet and its moons. Interstellar flights began in 902 E4 as part of the Styx missions, and continued until 978 E4. No records exist that explain the reasoning behind the cessation of flights, or those that do have yet to be discovered. Missions A given Styx mission would consist of three distinct parts: Away Leg, Departure, and Return Leg. The Away leg would consist of the crew taking their spaceship out to a designated point in space, referred to as the Departure Point. Once there, the traveling astronauts would make final preparations and enter their cryo pods. During Departure, the remaining crewmembers would align the ship with the target star, and fire off the cryo pods containing the exploring humans. Following a successful release, the Return Leg would see the spacecraft brought back to a launching station to be prepared for the next mission and refitted with any technology lost in transit. A given Styx mission would have anywhere from eight to ten astronauts aboard for the flight out to the launch point, then two for the trip back. The exploration crew would consist of an equal mix of scientists and more martially inclined individuals, referred to as Protectors, while the homebound crew consisted of a pair of pilots, or "Cabbies" as they would be affectionately called. Notably, the exploration crews would receive significant augmentations before even being sent to space, as a security measure against inherent flaws of human cryotech. Due to the time a journey to the Departure Point would take, each mission developed its own culture among the crew, as they would spend multiple years in transit. Typically, as part of this culture, astronauts would assign each other callsigns in the event they became necessary. Unfortunately, mortality rates among exploration crew average around 95% after Departure, due to chronic problems with the cryo pods and the nature of their aiming. Though rumors persist that not every astronaut actively volunteered for their mission, the official stance of AMSS is that every astronaut chose their one-way journey freely. Category:Fexalere Category:Fexalere Factions